December Days: Favourite prophet
Dec. 21st, 2014 11:06 pmI thought a lot about this. It's probably only since I was an adult that I had an idea what a prophet actually was: not someone who predicts the future per se, but someone who has messages from God, about what to do, or what is going to happen, or what is going to happen if you don't do something, etc.
Liv suggested Daniel, who did all sorts of proto-scientific things like disproving the existance of a rival diety, by showing it didn't really eat the massive offerings laid out for it, but that its preists snuck in and ate them in the night.
But somehow that didn't resonate with me. I also thought about what Jesus said, that he wished all the people were prophets. That it's something we can all strive towards. And that people who have apparently-supernatural insight (into moral or factual things), might approximate prophets. Does Newton count? He thought some of his great scientific insights came from God (at least, according to Neal Stephenson). But in that account, it doesn't feel right to me: his insights didn't seem to come from faith, as much by hard work, refusing to accept entrenched assumptions, and inventing calculus.
In fact, I'm thinking Moses. I've known this story for ages, but only recently actually thought about it. Moses claims to be no good at public speaking, and persuades God to let Aaron be the priest and let Moses get on with all the talking-to-God. And yet, he always ends up the leader anyway. And lots of the time, Moses is planning along with God, not just accepting instruction. And he always seems to have this long suffering leader experience I always sympathise with: he's desperately trying to chivvy people into doing what he thinks is right, but as soon as he takes his eye off them, they're worshipping idols or wandering off or disobeying God, or cursing firstborn, etc. And then he FINALLY gets everyone somewhere near the promised land, and has to die before they get there, and THEN they wander off and screw up settling the promised land for several generations.
Liv suggested Daniel, who did all sorts of proto-scientific things like disproving the existance of a rival diety, by showing it didn't really eat the massive offerings laid out for it, but that its preists snuck in and ate them in the night.
But somehow that didn't resonate with me. I also thought about what Jesus said, that he wished all the people were prophets. That it's something we can all strive towards. And that people who have apparently-supernatural insight (into moral or factual things), might approximate prophets. Does Newton count? He thought some of his great scientific insights came from God (at least, according to Neal Stephenson). But in that account, it doesn't feel right to me: his insights didn't seem to come from faith, as much by hard work, refusing to accept entrenched assumptions, and inventing calculus.
In fact, I'm thinking Moses. I've known this story for ages, but only recently actually thought about it. Moses claims to be no good at public speaking, and persuades God to let Aaron be the priest and let Moses get on with all the talking-to-God. And yet, he always ends up the leader anyway. And lots of the time, Moses is planning along with God, not just accepting instruction. And he always seems to have this long suffering leader experience I always sympathise with: he's desperately trying to chivvy people into doing what he thinks is right, but as soon as he takes his eye off them, they're worshipping idols or wandering off or disobeying God, or cursing firstborn, etc. And then he FINALLY gets everyone somewhere near the promised land, and has to die before they get there, and THEN they wander off and screw up settling the promised land for several generations.